Motor truck tractor and trailer units include releasable airbrake hose couplers for connecting the airbrake system and source of pressure air on board the tractor to the brakes of the trailer. Conventional airbrake couplers or connectors are characterized by opposed connector members which include cooperating tabs and flanges which allow the couplers or connectors to be engaged with each other by placing one coupler adjacent the other and rotating the couplers relative to each other to form the connection. The manual manipulation of these couplers in some way resembles a handshake and such couplers are often referred to as “gladhands”.
Conventional airbrake systems for motor trucks also typically include two separate pressure air conduits and respective sets of couplers, one for the main or so-called service brake system and circuit, and the other for the so-called emergency brake circuit. Accordingly, there are two flexible air hoses or conductors associated with a truck tractor which must be connected to separate couplers disposed on the trailer and disconnected from the trailer when the tractor separates from the trailer. This chore is not particularly vexing with conventional over-the-road trucking operations. However, in truck yard or so-called “terminal” operations trailers are constantly being moved about between loading docks and storage positions by a terminal type truck tractor. As many as one hundred and fifty to two hundred trailer moving operations may be carried out in a typical twenty-four hour period, each operation requiring the tractor driver to leave the driver's cab, connect the airbrake hoses to the trailer prior to moving the trailer and then leave the cab again to disconnect the air hoses from the trailer once it is properly parked. Clearly, the hose disconnecting operation is one which increases the cycle time of moving and parking a trailer.
Accordingly, there has been a desire to provide a brake coupler arrangement which would provide for remote release of the couplers or gladhands without requiring the tractor driver to leave the driver's cab. There has further been a need to provide a mechanism for control of and retrieval of the flexible brake lines or hoses connected to the brake couplers so as to prevent the couplers from falling to the ground when they are disconnected from the trailer or otherwise become entangled with the tractor undercarriage. It is to overcome the disadvantages of conventional airbrake hose and coupler arrangements for truck tractor-trailer units and to provide an improved coupler release and hose retrieval mechanism that the present invention has been developed.